Why do organisations get recruitment so wrong? And how benchmarking can help.

Do you need to have a degree?

Making it essential to have a degree, without suggesting that equivalent experience could be at least as valuable, is restrictive. And from our point of view, it’s not in line with attracting a diverse field of candidates. Why would you exclude people at this stage?

We don’t know what they may have been through and what they could have overcome to get where they are today. Their experience might be a lot more valuable than a degree could ever be. They could be very successful in similar (or better) roles, but just because they haven’t studied for a degree 10, 15, 20 or 35 years ago means that they are not entitled to apply. That’s a poor message to send out and you’re only shooting yourself in the foot.

It chimes with the current hashtag #NonGraduatesWelcome and their Twitter campaign to make charity job descriptions more accessible.

Excluding people from the outset

Let’s pretend that I’m applying for a job now. Luckily, I am a graduate, so I get beyond the ridiculous ‘only graduates’ essential requirement. But then I do a bit of digging and a company’s annual report is telling me that the person I will report to earns 87% more money than me. I’m already over-qualified for the role and prepared to be underpaid (the benchmarks show, it is definitely lowest quartile) and I want to work in this role, but it just doesn’t feel right.

OK, so it may niggle me, but at least that promotion will be worthwhile one day! The CEO must be brilliant, and I’ll learn a lot from them.

What’s that? I’d better get my skates on? Yes, there is a lengthy and unwieldy application form and I understand that you reserve the right to close the vacancy early if an amazing candidate comes along. That doesn’t sound fair – but if I get my application in now, perhaps they’ll close it for me?

What does all of this say about the values of the organisation. I hope that fairness, equity and equality of opportunity are not things they say they care about. Whoops… I think I’ll leave this one after all – if I can’t trust what they say now, it’s unlikely to improve once I’m in the door.

Real companies with bad recruitment processes

Sadly this is actually a real role currently being advertised within one of the sectors that we recruit within. It’s a senior leadership role, in a multi million-pound charity. It pays less than many middle management roles, and even less than some junior level roles across the sector.

Pay is always going to be different based on the finances of each organisation, the responsibility of the role and location of the organisation. Differences in pay are acceptable, but when candidates can see that they are earning around £25k less then they would for a comparative organisation, it’s not a good message to send to the market about the value you attribute to your staff.

Why does rubbish recruitment happen?

It could be a recruitment process developed by people who are perhaps naive and lack of experience. But regardless it will damage your employer brand. If you’re not sure, do some benchmarking, seek some free advice from people like me and ultimately set realistic expectations.

If those don’t match up with candidate expectations, you’ll fail to attract the right people and damage your employer brand irreparably.

Benchmark before you recruit – it’s common sense

A large part of what we do at Peridot, as well as finding and attracting great people in the right way, to your roles, is advise on how your role might be perceived and ensure you get your role profiles and salary ranges right.

If you have a critical appointment to make don’t risk getting it wrong, talk to us first, there is never an obligation on you to get some good advice.